343 Talks Halo 4 Master Chief Design

The long-awaited Halo game from 343 Industries is in the works, and the studio is talking about its take on the series hero.

343's community manager Jessica Shea (Bs Angel on the Halo forums) had some cool new info to share this week about the evolving character design for Master Chief. The post comes on the heels of an early look at the Halo 4 Master Chief in toy form that came out a few days ago.

"Typically, from Halo to Halo, the Master Chief’s armor has changed and adapted, and there have been fictional reasons why," Shea states. "With Halo 4, we’re taking a different approach and focusing on the storytelling aspects of art from the design standpoint. We don’t do that everywhere in the game, but we wanted to take this opportunity to really focus on him as a human being."

The altered physical design of the suit will apparently affect the way Master Chief plays in game, at least to some degree. "One of the Master Chief’s most notable physical characteristics is that he’s wearing 800 pounds of tank and jet fighter," Shea continues. "So we pulled that design into the armor and HUD. When you play Halo 4, it’s important you understand that you’re more than just a gun on the screen. To give you that feeling, we have represented that weight with player physics, without interrupting crosshair and shooting accuracy."

Here's hoping we'll get a closer look at what's going on beyond Master Chief's suit in Halo 4 sometime in the coming months.